By the Bev. Canon J. E. Jackson, F.S.A. 345 



not altogether free from a belief in the supernatural, in witchcraft.] 

 " Dr. Francis Hutchenson, in his historical essay on witchcraft, 

 written apparently about the year 1700, mentions no less than 

 twenty-four different works or essays which had all made their 

 appearance since the Restoration of Charles II., the greater part of 

 which had for their object the maintenance of the popular credulity 

 upon such points." Mr. Waylen adds that the performances at 

 Mr. Mompesson's house are now generally supposed to have been 

 the result of gypsy confederacy, though this was far from being the 

 opinion of the public at the time, or even of Mr. Mompesson him- 

 self, the owner of the house, for a son of his being asked by John 

 Wesley, many years afterwards, " What was his father's real opinion 

 of that affair ? " said, that whatever his father might have really 

 thought, he was obliged to treat it as a hoax, to keep people away 

 from his house : for so many came to visit it that he was afraid 

 they would eat him out of house and home. 

 Enough of the Daemon of Tid worth. 



Stokehenge Sarsens. 



The county boundary at Clarendon Hill, about a mile west of 

 North Tidworth, turns towards the south along an old landmark 

 called the "Devil's Ditch/' on the western side of Beacon Hill, 

 down to Park House. The burial mounds called barrows abound in 

 the direction of Ambresbury ; and no wonder, for we are approaching 

 what was once the fashionable burying-ground of eminent Ancient 

 Britons. 



It is tantalizing to pass by Stonehenge, so near our border-line, 

 in silence : but it would be impossible to give any satisfactory 

 account of that interesting ruin within the limits of our time : so 

 that I will only mention one point connected with it which I do not 

 remember to have seen noticed before. The larger stones, as you 

 all know, are called Sarsens ; but antiquaries are not all at one about 

 the meaning of the word. At Park Gate, on the county boundary, 

 on the road between Andover and Amesbury, there is, or was, in a 

 field abutting on a narrow lane leading from the roadside inn, a flat 

 stone, of large dimensions, lift, long, 12ft. in breadth, and 5ft. in 



